...And I'll confess to everything.

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New babies draw people. This is an accepted fact of life.

(To more accurately address this truth, we will be using the orthography newbaby, since this is the most widely employed term for this phenomenon.)

Newbaby dissolves the city-stranger mentality: when it is impolite to make eye contact, creepy to greet, and unforgivable to initiate a conversation with a personal question.* In this altered reality, it is not unheard of for cashiers to squeal over newbaby, parking spot neighbors to gush through their open window before putting their car properly in park, and for condo neighbors to yell at the yappy dogs next door because "SHHHHH! You'll wake the newbaby!"

I haven't yet gotten comfortable with the full range of comments and questions, but strangely enough, this is not the characteristic which unnerves me the most.

Gaze at my newbaby long enough and I will confess to everything.

I don't deny that the gazing is natural and understandable; I do it myself a good many hours every day. I only protest because the prolonged silence of the absorbed gazer makes me squirm and leap for ways to fill the silence with newbaby related trivia and miscellaneous confessions of well-intentioned mother-love gone wrong.

Like the hairbrush incident which explains the curious bald spot. Or exactly how long it has been since newbaby had his last bath. And maybe even the troubling truth regarding the number of seconds newbaby spends with his face hidden in his shirt in the process of being dressed and undressed.

I guess I can only hope that newbaby will so enthrall that no one will remember my self-incrimination.


*This does not hold as true in Southern California where we do not have sufficient weather to provide the niceties of impersonal conversation.

Comments

Emily (Laundry and Lullabies) said…
Ha! So true. I'm glad you're blogging again.

Congratulations on the newbaby. :) Sometime I'd love to hear how your birth went, if you're ok with sharing. Maybe via email.
3:29 PM
caedmonstia said…
If the silence feels too awkward to you, try something, like, "and his poop is like pudding!" I have found this to be a quick ice-breaker.
4:41 PM
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